FIFA’s actions demean soccer everywhere

It’s hard to juggle a football – okay, a soccer ball – knowing that indifferent tycoons are disfiguring the entire nature of the beautiful game. It’s hard taking in the fact that your beloved sport has become a slave in a giant, capitalist cesspool.

“Today, we are issuing FIFA a red card,” Richard Weber, U.S. Chief of I.R.S Criminal Investigation declared on Wednesday, a dark day for the sport’s international governing body.

Switzerland officials, the U.S. IRS, justice departments, and federal prosecutors for the Eastern District of New York announced criminal charges against nine officials of FIFA (the Federation of International Football Association) and five business associates for an alleged $150 million in graft gained through bribes, money laundering, and wire fraud.

They also disclosed the convictions (and assumed cooperation in their investigation) of another four individuals who played central roles.

The depth of the graft was stunning, even though it merely confirmed what many observers suspected. The audaciousness of authorities’ crackdown also left the head spinning.

Culture, and even the quality of competition, isn’t really the main component in choosing the next country to host the World Cup, longtime fans understand. It’s money, pure and simple. It is no news that FIFA has taken bribes from the affluent in countries such as Brazil, South Africa, and soon to host, Qatar.

Jack Warner was one of the indicted members of FIFA’s governing body.

Corruption among FIFA officials has been long under investigation, but some, including Warner, were especially crafty in ambiguity.

According to the Guardian newspaper in London, several secret reports indicate that the former FIFA vice president had been taking bribes from Qatari FIFA administrator Mohammed Bin Hammam in 2011. That could explain why Warner suddenly resigned in 2011. He of course used the standard excuse of going his own way to work for the people in his own country of Trinidad. He does not admit to any fraudulent activity, but the FBI recently uncovered evidence of his bribery activities that took place in 2010 and 2011.

I think the severity of FIFA’s actions cut deeper than just criminal activity.

While the bright stadiums in Rio De Janeiro and South Africa look like they are profiting from the most popular sporting event in the world, the reality is far different. The billions of dollars spent primarily go to benefit the already-wealthy, and do little to help the slums and impoverished communities in the host countries.

This is devastating because the people of these communities look to soccer for hope. Football, as they call it, is their legacy and their lifeblood. As they grow up with it in the streets, it encompasses their dreams of going pro.

The corruption isn’t at all surprising. Soccer is the most cherished sport in the world, and humankind has a reputation of corrupting the best things in life.

I’m not as much enraged as I am discombobulated. Staring aimlessly at my Xbox with FIFA ’13 still in it, and with my Chelsea flag hanging in my bedroom as reminder of my sell-out years, I know the best thing to do – gather your friends, take off your shoes, feel the grass between your toes and remember what football is truly about.

Put it all aside. The scandal coverage will pass soon enough, but football never will.